Jazz Beat Podcast

This edition of Jazz Beat presents an interview conducted by guest host Peter Sokolowski with Doc Severinsen, famous as Johnny Carson’s bandleader on The Tonight Show and a virtuoso trumpet player who still practices every day. This conversation took place before a live audience in the recital hall at UMASS Amherst, and covers subjects from Doc’s early career touring with big bands, his work as a studio musician in New York, and his television days.

This episode of Jazz Beat focuses on the one and only album that Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington made together. Tom Reney reviews the run-up to the Great Summit, highlights of the album, and thoughts on the legacies of these two jazz giants. 

Tom Reney offers an appreciation of piano legend Jaki Byard in this edition of Jazz Beat. Byard’s 95th birthday anniversary was June 22, and his legacy thrives both on records and through his well-known protégés Jason Moran, Larry Goldings, Marty Ehrlich, and Fred Hersch. Tom’s tribute includes personal recollections, details of Byard’s background in Worcester and Boston, and several musical samples.

Tom Reney looks back at Duke Ellington’s “New Orleans Suite,” and the crucial role that Duke and festival producer George Wein played in the establishment of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, which just completed its 49th annual presentation in the Crescent City. Wein’s insistence that any festival he produced would include Ellington, who “stayed only in the finest hotels,” and feature integrated ensembles was a spur to ending rigid segregation practices in New Orleans.

In the latest edition of Jazz Beat, Tom Reney explores the legacy of the bassist Scott LaFaro, who was a leading innovator in modern jazz and a member of the Bill Evans Trio. LaFaro was tragically killed in an auto accident in 1961 at age 25, and he’s the subject of an outstanding biography by his sister Helene LaFaro-Fernandez. Tom’s appreciation of LaFaro includes numerous samples of his music.

For Jazz Beat 30, Tom Reney pays tribute to Nat Hentoff, who died on January 7 at 91. The Boston-born journalist wrote primarily on First Amendment issues for the Village Voice for 50 years, but was also a renowned jazz critic and historian. In the early 1960s, Hentoff produced an outstanding series of albums for Candid Records by Charles Mingus, Clark Terry, Abbey Lincoln, and blues greats Otis Spann, Memphis Slim, and Lightnin’ Hopkins. Tom’s memorial includes excerpts from some of these, and an overview of Hentoff’s devotion to jazz and principles of free speech.

In the latest edition of NEPR's Jazz Beat, Tom Reney highlights the prominence of jazz in Bob Dylan’s memoir, Chronicles, Volume 1, and a critical moment of impact that the music had on the return to form that the Nobel laureate has exhibited since 1997.

For the latest edition of New England Public Radio's Jazz Beat, Tom Reney speaks with Loren Schoenberg, the founding director and resident scholar at the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. The museum has just released the first volume of recordings from the Savory Collection, a treasure trove of jazz recorded off of broadcasts in the 1930s and early ‘40s. Listen here for Coleman Hawkins, Ella Fitzgerald, Lionel Hampton, and other highlights from the collection, and a lively exchange between Loren and Tom.

In this edition of Jazz Beat, NEPR's Tom Reney pays tribute to the jazz legend Phil Woods. The late, great alto saxophonist was born in Springfield, Mass, 85 years ago. This month, Downbeat Magazine announced that Phil has been elected to its Hall of Fame. Listen here for an overview of Woods's career and numerous samples of his great music.

This edition of Tom Reney’s Jazz Beat podcast looks at Chuck Berry’s place in history as the original rock'n'roller turns 90. Tom features many of Berry's groundbreaking, eternally fresh singles and contemplates what this seemingly simple music says about us as a country.